A decent $50,000-a-year job isn?t that easy to come by for rookie job-seekers,but that?s what instructors at the Baltimore Electrical Joint Apprenticeship Training Center promise graduates pursuing an electrical career.
Tuition is free, but it takes five years? worth of intense course work and on-the-job training.
“Our students have worked on the Ravens? stadium, at Johns Hopkins University and all the large projects, including some at [the] NSA and Fort Meade,” said David Norfolk, an assistant director at the training center.
Norfolk said he hopes rising utility and energy costs will spark interest in solar power ? called photovoltaic systems in the industry ? among students, businesses and homeowners.
During a news conference earlier this month in Frederick, Maryland Gov. Robert Ehrlich proposed that the state buy 10 percent of its electricity from wind and solar power sources.
He also wants the state to install solar power systems on several public buildings, including the State Center office complex in downtown Baltimore and the Maryland Science Center in Baltimore?s Inner Harbor.
That was music to Norfolk?s ears.
“When the governor recommended putting [solar] panels on state office buildings downtown, I thought, ?We are on the forefront of trying to go to training on this technology,? ” he said.
All trainees going through the Baltimore electrical apprenticeship program will get classwork and hands-on experience working with solar power, installing panels and learning how the energy source works, Norfolk said.
It?s one of many electrical job training programs offered at the center.
About 100 trainees ? selected for their desire to pursue electrical work as a career and their dedication ? enter the program each year, Norfolk said.
Trainees range from recent high school graduates to immigrants and career-changers. Basic requirements for trainees are possessing a high schooldiploma or General Equivalency Diploma, being at least 18 years old and having one year of high school algebra.
The center is funded jointly by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union and electrical contract companies.
Michael Gill, president of the Gill Simpson Inc., a Baltimore-based electrical contractor, said his firm relies on trainees from the center to work at his company and become full-time employees.
In addition to weekly classes, trainees get paid to work daily with contractors during their five-year course work, Norfolk said.
